


Colourful

by Cruciothelights



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Anger, Angst, But still lovely for other ships :3, F/M, Fluff, Mollstrade Endgame, Romance, Threats
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-14
Updated: 2017-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-29 06:28:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/683874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cruciothelights/pseuds/Cruciothelights
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The men in Molly's life were mapped out like a rainbow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Yellow

**Author's Note:**

> Just something random. Not beta'd or Britpicked.

He was a lovely change. A lovely change from the blue hues of London, the hustle of busses and the monotone faces passing by, blurring into one. But not. They were all people and they were all... Blue. Molly hated the colour blue. Dark blue, which reminded her of the night, the sea, and the coat of Sherlock Holmes (which looked so lovely on him). She hated that she didn't at all hate the colour blue on him, not really. She didn't particularly like light blue, either. It was the colour of Sherlock's eyes in a particular light, or the colour of the sky on a really hot day, where her skin burned and her freckles spread. 

Jim wasn't blue. He was yellow, the colour of sun and joy and filled with maddening happiness. But sometimes his yellow burned too bright, too strong. It was too artificial, losing it's shine. She thought nothing of it most of the time, but when she noticed it, her stomach knotted and skin crawled. Only for a second. But then he had his moments where he was a wicked red; laughing manically, or even a mysterious black. Dark as the night without a moon. She didn't know what she thought of those moments. Sometimes it frightened her, the way she would hug him tight and pull back, catching his eye and there was a completely different man in front of her. But then his eyes flickered away and then back again. He would be her Jim again. Every time. 

She didn't know when his touch turned from blush-inducing (stammering, too) to a sort of wince bad-feeling shiver-inducing touch, but she noticed it for the first time in the lab with Sherlock. His hand on her back made her stomach turn as she forced a smile and attempted to make Sherlock Holmes jealous, even though she knew that would never work. Sherlock was brilliant and could see right through her facade. She thought it might have been caused by the night before when they had a quick snog at her doorstep. Things had gone a bit fast and she had stopped it, blushing and stammering, apologetically, of course. He looked really angry. 

He looked red. 

And he looked red for a while, even when she brought him inside to watch Dirty Dancing (apparently it was his favourite. Load of codswallop that was, he didn't give a rats arse about it), he glared at the telly when he thought she wasn't watching. But she was. And it scared her a bit. It was also a little bit exciting. He was so unpredictable and it made her wonder. 

But wonder was all she did. After the day in the lab where she found out that Jim was apparently gay, she broke it off with him. In person. What a mistake that was. He had pressed her against the wall and bit into her neck, making her gasp, and she almost yelled out. Almost. The moment seemed too intimate to disturb, his harsh breath against her skin, warm and inviting, yet she could feel something rise in her throat. She was well scared. He disturbed the silence anyway with a harsh (Irish accent? Where did that come from) whisper;

"You be careful, Molly-girl. Sherlock Holmes is bad company and anyone who walks with him is sure to meet her... Their bitter end." He pulled back and he wasn't her lovely yellow Jim, or even angry, red Jim. He was black and dark and looked simply evil, and that night when she got home and a black rose was on her bench, she let the tears fall. 

Her Jim was a dangerous man, for sure.


	2. Brown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John Watson manages to work his way into Molly's rainbow.

It was after that wretched Christmas party where everything had fallen to nothing, when Doctor John Watson properly introduced himself to Molly. At first it had confused her. Quite a bit, actually, since he had barely even spoken to her in the two years he'd been joining Sherlock in the labs. She suspected that he was acting on his initial reaction to her in that ridiculous dress that she had mistakenly worn to try and impress Sherlock (why did she bother?). Both John and Greg had reacted in the way she so desired Sherlock to, but she did feel the happy burn rising in her cheeks when John had to pick his jaw up off the ground, especially with his stunning girlfriend just hanging about.

So, it did shock her, in a way, to think that John Watson came alone to her labs, much to her disappointment. He had sat beside her, watching her do an autopsy, when she thought that it might make him uncomfortable;

"Are you okay just talking to me while I excavate this dead man's chest?" She looked beside her at him with a slight smirk, her lips curling up in quite a Sherlockian way. It would never happen around the man himself. _He_ cleared her head of all rational thought.

"Doctor, Molly." He tapped his nose and stood up to join her, looking at her notes, as if trying to think of a way to bring something up; "Do you wanna head to the pub with me? Not now, I mean. That would be quite hard while you're elbow deep in Mr. Hill." He had an awkward chuckle over his own ( _quite_ tasteless) dead man joke. "After your shift. Head over with me?"

Molly glanced at the good Doctor and smiled sweetly;

"I would love to." 

* * *

From the information that she had gathered about John Watson, his colour was brown. He was earthy and natural, so everything seemed to flow with his charming personality and his  _okay_ looks. He had seen better days, obviously, and his eyes seemed much older than the rest of him, so she knew that some time ago, he had seen some things truly awful. She knew he had been somewhat in the army, but that was the extent of her knowledge on the subject. 

Brown was safe. A bit dull, but warm and  _safe_ and very reliable. 

The way he looked at her made her cheeks glow happily, and her bum poke out  _just_ that little bit more, and she could feel his eyes on her. Not in a pervy way, just in an appreciative flirty, pub-date-tonight way. And she liked it quite a lot. Especially because she was covered in Christopher Hill's blood and body juices (mmm, delicious). It made the prospect of going out to the pub with him  _quite_ a nice one. She didn't have to worry about explaining her job doing autopsies on dead people, and she didn't have to explain that she absolutely loved it. People usually got a little freaked out by that. They thought she might get up and stab them just so she could cop a feel of their small intestine. 

* * *

John helped Molly with her coat and linked arms with her. That was nice. She looked at him as they walked down the corridor, towards the dark staircase that would take them up to the parking garage (It's a bit sad that the Morgue is  _below_ the parking garage. But she didn't mind). He looked happy to be with her. It probably wasn't just  _her_ , but he was like her. Craving attention and a proper human to talk to. He had Sherlock and Molly had her cat, Toby (who was probably actually better company than the consulting detective), and she thought for a moment that they were just the same. Two browns who want some safety and some reliability. None of that  _blue_ and especially no  _yellow/red/black_. Just safe, warm, brown.

At the pub, the two of them sat in a booth, chatting like two old friends, getting warm, then tipsy and then drunk, and then when Molly woke up beside the man, nude, the next morning (in  _her_ bed!), she found that she wouldn't mind living her life with a brown, because scratch the surface and you'll find a beautiful, calming, luscious green, or a partying, nutcase pink. 

Molly started to think that perhaps there wasn't one colour to fit a single person.


	3. Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The start with Sherlock

There was something about Sherlock Holmes that made her knees crumble and her speech falter, and she knew that it shouldn't do that to her, and she knows that she doesn't have a single chance with him, but she always reacts the same way. Sherlock was blue. She hated blue. But somehow with him, she didn't mind blue all that much. She hated the man Sherlock Holmes was, he was bigoted, selfish, rude and standoffish. None of that appealed to her in any other man. She would hate a man like that. But those men wouldn't be Sherlock Holmes. 

To Molly, Sherlock was also brilliant, caring (in his own way), calculative, and also unpredictable. Some days he wasn't blue. He had his moments of red, like Jim (Moriarty!), and every single colour she could think of. He was so diverse. But he was mostly blue. Cool and calming, but also harsh and deep. It was strange, hating something (or someone) and not really hating it (or them) as much as she initially thought. 

Sometimes, only sometimes, Molly would believe that he kind of not hated her back. 

One Christmas, before John (and Jim and everything that was horrible), when Molly was one of two Morticians that worked in Bart's hospital, he had come into the Morgue to check out some eyeballs she had been sneakily collecting, away from the prying eyes of Fitch, the nosy (other) Mortician who she didn't particularly like. Previously that day he had been trying to score a kiss from Betty, the pretty paramedic who had brought in their last stiff, by unceremoniously hanging up several sprigs of mistletoe. Now, while Fitch didn't score with Betty, he did score a rather enthusiastic kiss with George, but that's another story. 

The night Sherlock came in, Molly was busy recording notes for her latest autopsy. After he checked out the pile of ever growing eyeballs, he approached Molly and plonked beside her on the seat. 

"Molly. Bored." He moaned, like the petulant child he was (and still is to this day). 

"Sherlock. Busy." She continued writing down her findings, only to be interrupted again, by Sherlock tugging on her sleeve, looking up at the roof. 

"It seems that we are to kiss, Molly Hooper." He gave her a little cocky smirk, like he was glad that he was practically forcing her into giving him attention. Molly sighed and rubbed her forehead for a moment. 

"Sherlock... You don't... I mean... The mistletoe isn't mine. We don't have to kiss." Damn. She was doing so well with her coolness. She blushed brightly and looked back at her notes with a huff, when all of a sudden, Sherlock's fingers curled around the back of his neck, and he somehow sidled in for a kiss. She dropped everything and her fingers ran over his jaw as he kissed her quite expertly. When she was finally getting into the kiss, he pulled away, a twinkle in his (blue) eyes and walked out; 

"Merry Christmas, Molly Hooper." 

And from that moment on, she decided that Sherlock was merely a tease, had deducted her feelings, and was using them against her (was she wrong? No). 

She was so fucked.


	4. Purple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Greg Lestrade's not-so-brief story.

When Molly first met Detective Inspector Lestrade, he was a mere constable, working his way up the ranks and learning the murderous ways of the awful, terrible world they were in. Molly was new at the morgue, and she always found herself grinning at the easy going policeman as he walked into the room (which was probably a little indecent, since they were surrounded by dead folk. She had noticed that he was quite possibly one of the most handsome men she'd ever met, even though he was probably about ten years her senior. She had noticed the wedding ring, and she made sure no advances were ever made. But they were mates.

Greg was purple. He could be many shades of said colour. Dark and mysterious, playing bad cop to get what he wanted from a suspect (or Sherlock). He knew when he had to be professional and subdued, making sure that he got the job done before he slept and sometimes ate. Those were the times where Molly would force a coffee and a sandwich into his hands, insisting it was on her, and that he needed it. She considered him a good friend, a close friend, and she enjoyed the way that he could fade from a dark mauve to a bubbly bubblegum purple. Greg would take her out to the pub and they'd have a few drinks, cackling at things that probably weren't that funny. There was something about Greg that would make her swear like a sailor, and she would spout innuendoes that even the dirtiest of minds would blush over.

But soon, things became complicated. The shared a quick 'accidental' kiss when he hailed a cab for her, and they stammered, eyes shifting anywhere but each other. From then on, it was rushed goodbyes and quick body showings, never staying still to chat, no more coffee or night outs at the pub. It made her kind of sad, to see the man she was so close to, so distant. She had a feeling he felt guilty. Perhaps he thought that he'd led her on and she didn't like him all that much as a friend any more. But of course when she tried to bring it up, he'd make some shitty excuse, like he forgot that she absolutely knew when he was telling a lie. Then of course, she was smitten with Sherlock, so she didn't have time to care, quite frankly. Greg's marriage was on the rocks, and Sherlock (fake) killed himself, so with all that drama, she didn't really want to talk to him, thinking she might offend him, or even accidentally spill the beans and tell him that his friend wasn't actually buried six feet under. And then of course, one day they bumped into each other at Tesco's, they got chatting, his smile making her heart swell with affection for the man she was once close to.

His colour now was lilac. Calming and a little bit bright. He had left his wife, he said, and he looked so much better for it. A loveless, childless marriage, and a lot of tears (and a lot she'd been present for). She was glad that they'd finally filed for divorce. It let off so much of the pressure holding him back. She went out for coffee with this new lilac Greg, and he placed his hand over hers, asking her out to dinner one of these nights. She knew it wasn't a boozer, where they would laugh and have fun, but a proper date. She had nodded and left and skipped home in a dreamlike state of bliss.

After dating for three months, they made love (' _did the dirty_ ', as Molly would say, and Greg would just laugh and flick her nose, saying ' _making love'_ was much more romantic). The didn't feel pressure to do it earlier, and it was a very spontaneous thing. They didn't see each other much due to their hectic work schedules, but they were happy, and she loved it. Loved _him_. But, Sherlock had to come back and fuck it up.

That's when she saw Greg's red side. She had learned that almost everyone has that little tinge of red.


	5. Blue pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The moment Molly began to like the colour blue.

Molly knew that when Sherlock came to her, it was never because he craved her company, it was never because he wanted a chat, or yearned to see his face as she yearned for his at many a time during their friendship. Sherlock only ever came to her when he wanted something.

The night of the fall, when he made her promise not to tell a single soul about their plan, when his life was literally in her hands, she had not anticipated how unhappy this decision would make her in the future. But in that moment she didn’t care. She stashed away his lovely blue (she hated blue, she _hated_ blue!) jacket and shoes, and gave him a hooded jumper and trainers so he could leave unnoticed. Molly felt the tears rolling down her cheeks as she thought about what was yet to come, she felt devastated for John – she knew this could really break him. She also knew that this could be goodbye with Sherlock and she didn’t really want that at all.

“I won’t be gone forever, you know.” He murmured, as if he had read her thoughts. Sometimes she really did think he could.

“I know… No. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be crying.” She felt the tears continue to well up as she said this, “It’s… stupid.”

“Yes, it is.” Molly was almost angry at his words until he slunk up to her and grasped her by her shoulders, his hands running up her neck so his thumbs could wipe the tears from her sodden cheeks. She laughed awkwardly, and he pressed his forehead to hers, “Thank you, Molly. What you have done for me is… very helpful. Please look after John.”

  
He kissed her softly, quickly. It was not a kiss of passion, but more of gratitude, a reward, even. It wasn’t a kiss for him; it was for her.

 “Enough of that then.” Molly pulled back, wiping the remainder of her tears, deciding in that moment that she needed to pull herself together. Not just now, but forever. Sherlock was completely unattainable, dedicated to his life as a consulting detective, dedicated to John Watson, even if it was completely platonic (though she didn’t even know if that was the case). He gave her a small smile, strangely genuine for Sherlock Holmes and silently left the room. Molly felt at peace, her time basking under the blue-sky eyes of Sherlock had come an end and she was okay with that.

 

Maybe she would start to warm up to the colour blue after all.


End file.
